In Reply to: Learning Indonesian posted by Happy Holiday on Thursday, 5. June 2008 at 20:05 Bali Time:
You can learn through adult ed in Oz but I have found that the classes to be inconvenient if travelling for work. I then started to learn with a teacher in Indonesia but with work and travel it was a problem so I ended up removing myself from work and doing some intense weeks.
I was fortunate that the company offers language lessons. I enrolled in Colarado School in Yogyakarta for 2 weeks...you do 3 sessions per day and 1 on Saturday and it's one on one but different teacher each session usually.
Some folk were there for 1 week...it is a small place and the teachers seem to stay so if you go back a year later they are likely to be the same...and they remember you...for all the right reasons I hope!
You work through a structured program and it is related to most things you need to know and they can help with work related things. They also encourage you to go on an excursion with the teacher where you get to do the talking in Indonesian e.g. taxi directions etc...some people go to Bourobadour of course and others like me to local market.
Yogaya is a good place to go as it is not so big to get around, has plenty of places of interest and English not so much spoken in the street.
The other place that is becoming a tad popular is Lombok at the University...many Phd students and quite a mix bag of people (you could be surprised) are beginning to enrol in classes enough to make them regular. There are also some good little schools run by folk with language degrees with links to university.
Sorry about length of this but I really think unless you are particularly gifted in languages then some face to face is required and it is difficult to mix with work so the need to spend more intense time is good and Yogaya is well known for langauge courses. Many people suggest that if you want some langauge immersion then you need to get out of Bali...sorry folks!